Menu

Mister Slime

Imagine if all the videogame characters ever created had a party, shindig, get-together, ho-down or any other number of ways to reference a good time out. Now imagine if at this party there were lots of tables, and characters chose and sat next to whomever they wanted. You might see the bubbly and equally drunk Mario and Lugi entertaining Daxter, Guybrush Threepwood and Sonic with their unique rendition of ‘My Endless Love’. Just opposite you’d perhaps catch a glimpse of Gordon Freeman and Otacon discussing quantum physics, as Solid Snake tries to avoid Lara Croft’s advances (she’s hopeless at holding her drink you see). Now scan your imagination to the very back of the room. There you would find the likes of Mister Slime – sitting there trying to strum up petty conversation alongside the likes of Master Chief, Waluigi and Raiden.

“It’s immediately obvious that you’re just doing the same things every time but in a different, but equally dull game world”That ultimately is Mister Slime’s downfall. It’s just… boring, which is disappointing because there’s a sense of real potential underneath the monotony. As you’d expect, Mister Slime takes advantage of the DS’s touch screen capabilities, and players are able to take this green blob and nothing else past the surface and attach his four arms to anchors, which is how he moves about. In all fairness, this is actually quite an intriguing gameplay mechanic; despite the fact that it’s a little laboured and takes a good grasp of multi-tasking – something most men are naturally inhibited by – in order to move across the levels smoothly. However, this one party trick, joke, quirk, whatever, is all Mister Slime has up his sleeve, and it becomes quickly and worryingly apparent that what you’ve been doing for the first ten minutes is exactly what you’ll be doing for the next couple of hours.

This doesn’t always spell disaster however; Halo: Combat Evolved made its name by boasting that it was the same 30 seconds of fun over and over again – and it was true. Unfortunately for old Mister Slime, the truly mundane, uninspired level design only highlights this problem and it’s immediately obvious that you’re just doing the same things every time but in a different, but equally dull game world. The game does throw some things into the works to try and spice it all up. For example, Mister Slime can slingshot himself into enemies, levitate by blowing into the microphone of the DS, or put himself out if he so happens to combust on screen. Players’ main option of defence against bad guys (aside from simply just ignoring them) is swatting them away by scratching the touch screen with one of Mister Slime’s four arms. This only deters them for about a second before they start chewing or tickling your arms (hard to tell) again, and choosing to bypass them altogether will become a far more enticing option as time goes on. This because the game seems to have a hard time calculating when you want to scare an enemy away, often resulting in your descent back the floor of the level for attempt number two.

“That ultimately is Mister Slime’s downfall. It’s just… boring”Visually, it’s passable if nothing else. Each of the five different worlds you can explore are different enough by colour alone even if that’s a case of all style (I use that word very, very loosely) and no substance when it comes to the actual gameplay differences in the levels. The characters you’ll come across on the other hand, are arguably more vegetable-like in persona than Mister Slime himself. On your travels you’ll meet gaudy characters such as Mister Slime with glasses, Mister Slime with long hair, and Mister Slime with moustache – all as mind numbingly uninteresting as each other.

Mister Slime is the dictionary definition of bland. It does everything to a slightly worst standard than gamers expect or deserve and its false charm can’t even jump in to save it, because it’s simply not there. This a game you’ll probably not want to sit down and get to know too well, so go sit at the other tables instead – I heard they’re much more fun to be around. Look, Princess Peach is doing shots of tequila over by the live band.